Chapter 15 Sensations #2
I move my hands down her sides and kneel so I can keep touching, down, down, past the hem of her dress to her naked knee and smooth leg. Down the sensitive skin of the ankle and up again, on the inside this time. I move up slowly, and she shifts her leg. She wants more.
Using only my fingertips, I trace up her thigh, under the skirt of her dress and to the edge of her underwear.
She moans, and it nearly wrecks me.
I continue teasing her; tracing the edge of her underwear across the top, letting my knuckles skirt along the skin above. Her stomach is soft, just like the rest of her I’ve had the pleasure to touch.
“Oh, God,” she whispers.
I wish she’d say my name. But I’ll be patient. I don’t even know what I’m doing with her, so it’s for my own good she doesn’t know it yet.
My fingers come down on the other side, and in this absolute darkness, I feel everything. Hear everything. I’m so attuned to her sounds. Every little gasp and every whimper is amplified.
I brush across the front of her panties. Her breathing quickens.
Fucking hell, she’s soaked. I groan at the thought of her wet pussy on my face.
I let my hand drop, and she makes that adorable little whine again. This time, I trace the inside of her knee and thigh with my nose, lightly kissing my way up.
Her hands find my hair as I move my way up. Her skin feels even silkier against my lips and nose. When I find her middle again, she inhales sharply.
Oh, how I want to taste her.
I kiss the outside of her wet panties. They feel like lace, and I would give an arm and a leg to see her in them right now. I press my lips against her centre and blow a hot breath. She shivers and grasps my hair tighter.
“I’m about to fall apart,” she whispers, and I support her with one arm while I let the other find the hem of her underwear. I slide a finger under and down, going slow, giving her a chance to say stop if she wants to.
“This okay?”
“Mmm,” she moans. “More.”
I slide the wet fabric aside and kiss her pussy to a moaned agreement. I flick my tongue through her slit and feel her weight on my arm as she struggles to stay standing.
“Fuck, you taste so good,” I rasp and taste her again, harder this time, holding on to her backside.
I’m about to come in my pants.
Her mewling. The warm, wet cunt on my face. The intoxicating taste of her on my tongue.
“Mmm,” I hum, and her hands grasp my hair as she gasps.
The robotic voice sounds again, and I ignore it.
I’m in heaven. Not what I expected of tonight, but now I don’t want to be anywhere else. This woman is addictive.
The robotic voice sounds out again, harsher this time, and I chuckle against her pussy, drawing a laugh from her that shifts into a groan. Stopping that was a serious testament to my self-control. My cock is throbbing hard for her.
“Oh, Robin,” she sighs.
Hearing her say a name that’s not my own, pulls me out of my daze. The urge to tell her who I am, and to finish this in the light after we complete the maze, hits me.
“Brain not working,” she says and fumbles for my hand. I laugh and throw my arm around her waist, and she holds on as we follow the rope to the last part of the sensory journey.
“I can’t believe I let you do that,” she says. “I mean, I rarely let my guard down this easily. Something about you just makes me feel it’s safe to be exposed like that.” She hums, thinking.
Who the fuck made her feel like she couldn’t open up?
“I don’t know if it’s the dark and the anonymity, or if it’s you,” she continues, “but I feel so brave and free in your company.”
There’s a vulnerability in her voice now. The thought of someone taking advantage of her trust pisses me off. I clench my jaw. Fuck, why do I care so much? This is even further from my plan.
Bloody hell, I’m so confused, and this darkness is suffocating.
I shift my grip to hold her hand instead, suddenly feeling the need for more space.
“Hm,” is all I muster.
She squeezes my hand in response.
“You’re a bit of a puzzle, Mr Hood,” she says.
“What do you mean?”
“I get the impression you’re a man who’s usually in charge, the way you demand instead of ask. But yet, sometimes you seem like you’re fighting yourself.”
“Oh?”
“Earlier, you were holding me close, and then pulled back. And you did it now as well.”
“Did I?”
“I’m guessing you felt as if we were getting too intimate? And you texted me for a whole day and then not for a week. Am I … I don’t know… am I not what you’re looking for? I’m not sure what I’m asking.” She blows out a breath and stops walking.
I wish I could see her face now. To hold it in my hands and kiss her happy.
“You are decidedly not,” I say and realise immediately it came out wrong.
“Oh,” she sounds disappointed, trying to let go of my hand, but I won’t let her.
“What I mean is, I wasn’t looking for anything. Being with someone is not something I was working towards. It’s never been on my schedule.”
Way to go. I said the word schedule. Very sexy.
“You never had love in your life?” she asks, and makes it sound so much sadder than it is. I stroke her arm with my other hand and pull her closer.
“I did once, sort of, but I didn’t make time for it,” I say into her hair.
“What happened?”
“I couldn’t give her the attention she deserved.”
She shifts away from me, letting cold air in between us, and pulls me along to keep walking.
I trace my hand along the velvet rope, grateful she can’t see my face after that conversation.
She’d be looking for remorse, some kind of sadness.
But I don’t regret not fighting for Jody.
I don’t regret not trying to keep an ‘okay’ relationship on the side of building my businesses.
“Has anything changed since then?” she asks. “Why are you here with me?”
“I’ve asked myself that a few times,” I mutter and regret how it sounded.
She huffs, and I pull her flush to my side, trying to focus on her little sounds and what they might mean as well as walking blindly through this space.
“Look—” I start, but am not sure what I’m supposed to say. “I wanted to meet you today to confirm that what you stirred up in me last weekend was just physical. Which would be something I can understand.”
As if I can sense an obstacle, I reach out and find what feels like the side of a leather booth or couch.
The robotic voice calls out again that we’re at our final destination and to find our seats. A server will be out shortly to take our orders.
“And what did you decide?” Alice asks, ignoring the tinny voice from above.
I find her face and cup it in my hands, stroking my thumbs over her cheeks. Her bottom lip.
“I’m still confused.” I pause, trying to find the right words. “Being with you is freeing too, and what you said means a lot to me. But it’s all new to me. I need to think through what I can offer. And then I would very much like to see this face and take you on a proper date. If you will have me.”
“I’d like that. I’ll give you the time you need,” she whispers. She leans her cheek into my palm and kisses my wrist. “Please tell me you’re not doubting it because I’m not … a private members’ club kind of person.”
Does she mean because she’s not wealthy? Have I doubted it? Maybe I did, but now it doesn’t feel like it matters at all. I just want to be near her.
“Or because of my modelling job?”
The way her voice just shrank makes my heart constrict.
“No, absolutely not.” The words tumble out of me before I can control them. Is it even what I was going to say? Is it true? Now I wish I could see her face. Being in the darkness is bearable only for so long.
A server arrives and helps us into the booth.
After giving them our preferences, and we’re alone again, I thread my fingers through Alice’s delicate hand and enjoy the skin-on-skin sensation of my forearm against hers.
“You know, this experience was more than I thought it could be,” I say. “I’ve never stopped and smelled the roses, so to speak. Never heard the crickets.”
“One day I dream of having a garden that sounds like that. I’ll sit in an egg-chair, feeling the light warm breeze on my skin, the sun will dance through the canopy above me and I’ll be content.”
I don’t speak. I can picture it, although annoyingly Alice’s face resembles that frustrating girl from the office in my mind’s eye.
Keen to replace that image with what Alice might really look like, I slide a hand up her shoulder to find where her jawline starts.
I trace the edge of it to her chin, then up her lips, her cupid’s bow, up her nose tip and across her eyebrow.
It doesn’t help change the image, but her breath on my hand, the feel of her skin, makes my body tingle.
The final sensory experience is a taster of Millefleuré’s signature dishes. We’re served a mini degustation, including a chocolate soufflé that makes her moan so much I’m getting jealous.
“I can’t believe how good food tastes in the dark,” she says, humming while finishing the dessert. The sound of the spoon clinking and scraping against the glass or ceramic cup tells me it must be done.
“I can’t believe how good your pussy tastes in the dark,” I rasp, and she laughs.
A bouncy, genuinely joyful sound I could listen to forever, and I pinch my eyes shut despite not seeing anything.
This went from a date to make sure she’s nothing special, to confirming the exact opposite. Why is that so fucking scary?